We all live by a code. In occupational health, that code is often written in Washington D.C. For years, our code was clear, etched in the stone of OSHA regulations. It was a good code, born from a desire to protect American workers. But it was old. And it was holding us back.
This is the story of how we found a better way. It’s a story for every occupational health provider who has ever wrestled a sound booth into a noisy factory, only to fail the ambient noise check. It’s for every business that believes, like we do, that protecting your people shouldn’t be a logistical nightmare.
It’s a story about unlocking human potential.
The Chains of the Old Way
Let’s be honest. For years, we felt more like a moving company than a healthcare provider.
Our mission at Apex Occupational Health has always been simple: to deliver the highest standard of hearing conservation to the American workforce. Our team is passionate. Our standards are impeccable. But our tools… our tools were stuck in the 1980s.
The enemy wasn’t noise. It was the silence we were forced to create.
Our world was dictated by OSHA’s 29 CFR 1910.95, Appendix D, Table D-1. Those Maximum Permissible Ambient Noise Levels (MPANLs) were our bible. Forged in an era of bulky, inefficient supra-aural headphones, the rules were strict. They demanded a level of quiet that a bustling factory floor could never offer.
So, we bought the booths. Heavy, expensive, sound-dampening boxes.
We’d roll up to a client’s site—a state-of-the-art manufacturing plant, a high-energy assembly line—and begin the painful ritual. Finding the space. Finding the power. Calibrating the sound level meter, holding our breath, and hoping the ambient noise inside our “quiet” booth met the standard.
Too often, it didn’t.
A forklift rumbles by. The HVAC system kicks on. The sheer energy of American industry was too much for our booths. We’d have to reschedule. We’d have to ask our clients to shut down a section of their plant. We’d have to tell employees to trek across a massive campus to a quiet office we had commandeered.
It was inefficient. It was expensive. It was a barrier between people and the quality healthcare they deserved. We were fighting to uphold a standard, but the fight was against practicality itself. We were limiting our own ability to serve.
We knew there had to be a better way. We just didn’t know the code had already been rewritten.
A Spark of Imagination
True innovation doesn’t just improve the old way; it imagines a completely new one. Our “what if” moment came from Dr. Maria Sanchez, our lead audiologist.
“What if we’ve been solving the wrong problem?” she asked in a team meeting. “We spend all this energy trying to make the room quiet. What if the technology could create the quiet, right at the ear?”
It was a provocative thought. It was a daring question. It was the spark we needed.
Around the same time, our compliance manager made a discovery that would change everything. It wasn’t hidden. It was right there, in plain sight: an OSHA Letter of Interpretation dated October 11, 2022.
The letter was a key. It unlocked a door we never even knew was there. It stated that OSHA would permit the use of the more modern ANSI S3.1-1999 standard for determining MPANLs when using insert earphones.
The chains broke.
We weren’t tethered to the old table anymore. We could use a newer, smarter standard. A standard designed for modern technology. Technology that could, as Dr. Sanchez had imagined, create the quiet right at the ear.
Our search for that technology led us to one place: GeoAxon.
The Kuduwave: A New Tool for a New Code
When we discovered the Kuduwave Prime audiometer, we didn’t just see a product. We saw the future of our company.
Here was a device built for the world we actually work in. It was designed for “boothless” audiometry. Its power lies in its integrated design: insert-style transducers with high-attenuation foam eartips, all housed within a circumaural earcup.
This system doesn’t just block noise. It creates a pristine, controlled acoustic environment for testing, no matter where you are.
This was the technology we had imagined. But the real breakthrough came when we learned how to apply the new rules to this new tech. GeoAxon introduced us to a white paper that laid out a brilliant strategy, one that was both compliant and incredibly practical.
It was called the “Noisiest Permissible” Hybrid MPANL.
The logic was daring, yet perfectly sound. It takes the OSHA-approved ANSI S3.1 standard for insert earphones and combines it with the old OSHA Table D-1. For each frequency, you simply use the least stringent value—the one that allows for the most ambient noise.
Let’s be clear: this isn’t a loophole. This is using OSHA’s own interpretations and standards to your advantage. It is a fully compliant, scientifically robust way to maximize your testing capabilities.
For us, it was the final piece of the puzzle.
The Apex Transformation: Well Beyond Innovation
Today, Apex Occupational Health looks nothing like it did two years ago. The sound booths are gathering dust in a warehouse. Our team is liberated.
Our audiologists now walk onto a factory floor with a Kuduwave Prime in a portable case. They find a worker on their break, sit them down in a quiet corner of the facility—not a silent one, a reasonably quiet one—and conduct a perfect, OSHA-compliant hearing test.
The results are staggering.
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- We Serve More People: We can now conduct hearing tests in environments we used to run from. We’re reaching thousands more workers every year, expanding care without the financial hardship of old methods.
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- Our Results are Better: The Kuduwave, combined with the Hybrid MPANL, isn’t just about convenience. It’s about accuracy. By ensuring ambient noise doesn’t interfere with the critical frequencies for detecting a Standard Threshold Shift (STS)—2000, 3000, and 4000 Hz—we are identifying hearing changes earlier and more reliably than ever before.
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- Our Clients are Happier: We’ve reduced testing time per employee by over 50%. We cause zero operational downtime for our clients. We provide them with more accurate data, which reduces their risk of litigation and, more importantly, helps them build a truly effective hearing conservation program.
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- Our Business is Stronger: We are winning contracts we never could have competed for before. We are seen not just as a service provider, but as an innovative partner who brings solutions, not problems.
We stopped fighting the noise. We embraced a technology that conquers it. We stopped being a moving company and became what we were always meant to be: a leader in human-centered healthcare.
Your Invitation to the Future
This journey has taught us that true progress isn’t just about adopting new technology. It’s about having the courage to challenge old conventions and the imagination to see a better path forward.
We share our story not to boast, but to inspire. We believe every organization dedicated to occupational health deserves to be unchained from the old way. Your people, and the clients you serve, deserve the efficiency, accuracy, and accessibility that modern technology provides.
If you’re still wrestling with sound booths, if you’re still limited by outdated standards, we invite you to ask the same question we did: “What if there’s a better way?”
There is. It’s time to change the code.
The science and strategy that guided our transformation are not a secret. They are based on objective, evidence-based research. We encourage you to see the data for yourself. Read the foundational white paper from GeoAxon and unlock the potential for your own organization.